G Train

Republican mayoral candidate, Paul Massey, unveiled a transit infrastructure plan Monday, that included an idea to create a G train loop that would travel to Manhattan to help commuters during the 15 month-L train shutdown next year. Although little details have been revealed, his plan would presumably travel through Midtown on the F train route, loop back into Queens on routes used by the M and R train and then reconnect with the G at the Court Square stop in Long Island City. While a notable idea, according to Crain’s the MTA looked over Massey’s plan and said its implementation would be impossible.

In response to the looming 15th-month L train shutdown, which will affect its nearly 225,000 daily riders beginning April 2019, real estate developers have started looking at Williamsburg’s hip and slightly cheaper neighbors, Greenpoint and South Williamsburg. Both areas sit nearby the G, J, M and Z trains, and in the past have offered a variety of housing options at cheaper prices. According to the New York Times, as developers begin their plunge into Greenpoint, sites along these train lines have become pricier and more difficult to lock down.Find out more

Considering it’s taken the city nearly 100 years to get the Second Avenue Subway moving and that the MTA is over its head in debt, we’re not holding our breath that any other major expansion work will take place in the system, but we can all dream, right? Take for instance these new maps created by cartographer Andrew Lynch as part of his Future NYC Subway series. He envisions the G train, which currently only connects Brooklyn and Queens, making two loops into Manhattan — one Downtown and one in Midtown. As Curbed notes, “It’s a slightly convoluted proposal,” but Lynch clearly put a lot of thought into his scheme, even figuring out the tunnels and connection points the train would take.

261 Hudson Revealed: Related Companies has released the first renderings of a rental building at 261 Hudson Street between Spring and Canal, and The Real Deal has it for you.

Toilets That Would Make the Charmin Bears Happy: Developers for the Sterling Mason in Tribeca are adding “smart toilets” that play music and relaxing sounds, according to the New York Post. We say that’s one expensive potty training mechanism.

Increased G Train Service Starting Today: If you find yourself preparing to challenge Usain Bolt every morning on the way to work you’ll be happy to know that the MTA plans to increase service starting today. However, for every action there’s an equal and opposite reaction. Brooklyn Magazine has more on the good news, and the not so great accompanying news.